Yes , It is Bad Times in Cumbria , but as ever such happenings are rarely the consequence of bad luck , more down to rank bad management.
In Towns case , they continue to be held back by the Legacy of their one season in Super League 1, the debts they incurred and the fall out from that continues to cast a long shadow over Derwent Park .
As for Whitehaven , well their demise hs bee rapid but at the same time totally avoidable . They over spent after 2005 on overated out -of-town pros with big reputation and even bigger wage demands . All this while the RFL were making it quiet clear the Recre was not good enough for SL .
The retirements of Seeds, Lester , Fatialofa etc were entirely predictable and ,a war chest to get the club over a dificult few years should have been put in place , but two differant adminstrations at the club since 2007, couldnt or wouldnt make the hard decisions that might have given the club a club of staying competitive .
So Haven now run by an American Chairman who nows next to nowt about RL , with a Board of Local Councillors in support , are at the brink and are having to make the hard decisions that should have been made 12 or 18 month ago . Added to the financial meltdown, the same Board continues to swear blind alliegance to Coach Ged Stokes ,his team having lost 11 straight games . What other club in whatever sport would retain their team boss with such a record ???
Is it any real surprise therefore that the 1800 to 2000 Haven fans of recent years have now voted with their feet , remember it is those people who have spend their hard hard earned cash, to support a disfuntional club with a non performing coach and team . Itdont think so
With the right calibre of people running the Club and a coach who can get results many of those stay aways will return of that I am sure .
The one optimistic note from a Whitehaven view point is that despite the undouted pull of SL clubs on the Areas junior talent , Havens youth policy continues to be productive with both scholarship 15 and 16 age group teams showing up well in the recent round of fixtures .
So coming to the issue of Super League , it nice for all you people down their in M62 land to offer advice , but what will be the result of the coming together of 2 struggling - poorly manged clubs , a slightly larger but still struggling poorly managed club . Dont think thats going to meet any of the RFLs SL licencing criteria.
But just moving things on - some think that a Cumbrian SL club is a fait accompli of the RFL !!!
In 2007 Tony Colyer the then Vice Chairman of Barrow put together an extensive paper on how he thought Cumbria could put a bid forward for SL , this was shared bewteen the 3 pro clubs and the RFL . It wasnt perfect but certainly was a basis for further discussions .
As of July 2010 there has yet to be an acknowledgement of this paper by the RFL , and remains the biggest idictment of the RFLs attitude to Cumbria and SL
.